China, Poland Launch Joint Research to Promote Space Weather Monitoring

A Chinese-Polish joint program is launched recently to develop technologies and methods for real-time space weather monitoring based on BDS, Galileo and GPS. The program is co-led by the Aerospace Information Research Institute (AIR) in Chinese side, together with its Polish counterpart, the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, and is financially supported by the National Key R&D Program of China.

This program concentrates on an important area of space research – space weather monitoring – through the development of new technologies and methods of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) -based ionospheric monitoring. The ionosphere is a region of Earth's upper atmosphere, from about 60 km to 1,000 km altitude, and includes the thermosphere and parts of the mesosphere and exosphere. It is ionized by solar radiation, plays an important part in atmospheric electricity and forms the inner edge of the magnetosphere.

The program focuses on the development of novel theory and methodology for 2D and 3D real-time (RT) ionospheric modelling and reconstruction by utilizing the new signals and constellations of modernized multi-GNSS systems (e.g. Chinese Beidou System(BDS) and EU Galileo), with a goal to establish operational ionospheric services for precise geodetic applications and space weather monitoring in RT mode.

Both Chinese and Polish participants have wide experiences in ionospheric research and long partnership. Among Chinese participants, AIR acts as satellite navigation development center and aerostat system R&D center of CAS, and has developed China’s first BDS/GNSS ionosphere monitoring receiver (BDSMART). AIR has established laboratorial calibration environment for GNSS ionosphere monitoring receiver, and set up two regional GNSS tracking networks to support ionospheric scintillation monitoring and GNSS augmented precise positioning in low- and mid-latitudes of China, as well as the IGS Ionosphere Associate Analysis Center.